Call me blinkered; I'm not sure I have ever logged on to a .cn -- that's China to you -- website. But, just in time for Beijing's Olympic moment, jiapu.cn is one to give you a little shiver.
Jiapu.cn gives access to the Shanghai Library's collection of jiapu, traditional family history documents that have been maintained in China over hundreds of years. The site promises eventually to cover 181 million names and 22,000 family histories. Some of the jiapu were printed in the 14th century, and their male lineages go back as far as 2600 years. What was grannie's maiden name again?
Fair warning: the family histories are presented in their original languages and the whole site operates in Chinese ideograms.
